Interviews : Cannibal Corpse (Paul Mazurkiewicz) – 16/02/2009

Cannibal Corpse have been at the forefront of death metal for years, and rightfully so. They prove time and time again that not only do they plan on staying as brutal and heavy as possible, they still know how to keep it entertaining. Now onto their eleventh studio album, Cannibal Corpse are on top of their game with ‘Evisceration Plague’ hitting #66 on the Billboard 200, their highest charting album yet. I had the opportunity to talk to Paul Mazurkiewicz, drummer and one of the two longest-standing members, about all things Corpse.

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MO: You guys recently released your new album, ‘Evisceration Plague’, are you happy with the way it has all turned out?

Paul: Oh definitely. I mean, we think it’s an amazing record, all around great production. We feel that we’ve written some great songs and we executed them very, very, very, very good. So yeah, we’re one hundred percent pleased with the new CD, that’s for sure.

MO: Is there any particular area that you think it’s an improvement over ‘Kill’?

P: I think the biggest improvement, and I think it certainly is an improvement, is the use of the click-track that we did this time around. I never usually play to one, at all. We did use it a little bit in the past but very minorly, but this being the first album that we wrote and recorded to the click-tracks, I think it’s just made for a much tighter Cannibal Corpse. I mean, I think we were pretty tight to begin with but just adding the click just tightened it up a little bit more so. So, I think that’s the big difference and that’s why I would think it’s a little bit of a step up from Kill.

MO: Was the decision to use the click made because your music is perhaps becoming more and more technical as the years go on?

P: A little bit. Alex has definitely been pushing that way for the last few years, and he had suggested it before. You know, I think even in the past when he wrote his songs it was to a click, even though we didn’t then play to that. But he strongly suggested it and I just thought, yeah let’s do it, I’ll do whatever I can to better myself and the band and keep everyone happy, well then let’s just give it a shot. I’m glad we did now. It’s really one of those things that when you look back you wish you had done it earlier, but yeah it definitely helped in the song writing and getting everything as perfect as it can be.

The way Alex writes these days, at his home studio through the computer and stuff, he’s definitely into being very precise in that manner so of course it made sense for him wanting it on his songs especially. He wrote the songs that way, to be as perfect as they can be, so it was something that just needed to be done and it was definitely a very good thing that we did it.

MO: ‘Evisceration Plague’ is the bands highest charting album, reaching #66 on the Billboard 200, were you ever expecting such a positive response?

P: We were hoping so. It seemed to be getting very good responses, you know after releasing ‘Centuries of Torment’ and all of the other pre-release hoopla and all that kind of thing. And Kill was doing very well, and did well when it was released and we did some big tours for that all over the world. The response to that was great so we were just hoping that, well we like this better than Kill and if Kill did so well then maybe this one can draw some more attention. A lot of things have happened in three years, like I said with the big tours and releasing the DVD and the band just having that momentum from releasing Kill, it all meant we were really hoping that it would do well. Then when we saw the chart success and how well it did we just thought it was awesome because it’s obviously been our biggest first-week seller in a lot of countries. This is definitely our biggest album right now and it’s great. We were really looking forward to seeing how the release of the CD would go.

MO: Can you give us a bit of an insight into the writing and recording process of the album?

P: Alex wrote about 75% of the songs on the new album, he wrote I think 7 songs and collaborated with Rob one 1 of the songs. Pat wrote 2 of the songs, Rob wrote another whole one, and I actually wrote one too. So yeah, I already sort of mentioned how Alex writes. He just sits in his home studio, writes the songs on his bass, then puts it through the computer and actually churns out all the guitars, drums and everything that he can program. Then he gives us a CD with the whole song done like midi, and it’s just like “killer, that’s awesome”. That’s why it all falls his way because he can utilise all these tools as to where say Pat or Rob are a little bit more conventional and do it the old school way of sitting around and coming up with riffs. They’re getting a bit more into computers, but nowhere near as much as Alex is. I’m more likely to sit around with Rob or Pat, throwing ideas around about their songs and then we’ll show it to the rest of the guys. As for myself, being the drummer and I can play a bit of guitar at home, write the songs and then show it to Pat or whoever in the same way they would, and we’ll each play our parts.

That’s pretty much how it’s written these days, it isn’t really much of a collaborative effort. Like I said, there was one song where myself, Alex and Rob collaborated and that was more just on-the-fly, in the practice room. That was ‘Scalding Hail’ on the new album, it’s a very short song but we kind of seem to do that on every album. We’ll write one or two real quick ones with only a few riffs, it feels like a real old school way of writing, like how we used to do it back in the day, which was of course us being entirely collaborative and just going “hey I got a riff” and then just putting a song together. That’s how basically the first three Cannibal Corpse albums were written. So things are definitely done differently and, basically I just stated aaall of it.

MO: Do you have a personal main focus when writing one of your own songs?

P: Well, you know of course I want it to be heavy. If I’m writing the riffs, I mean I wrote ‘Submerged in Boiling Flesh’ on the last album and ‘Carrion Sculpted Entity’ off the new one, you know I just want them to be heavy and I want them to fit the Cannibal sound. But I figure if I’m writing the drums and guitars then it’s just going to be Cannibal because I just don’t write in any other way. So yeah I just want it to be heavy and a bit different. Of course it’s going to be different, because it’s me writing rather than any of the other guys, which I think is a good thing too because it gives the band and the album that bit more diversity when you have more song writers.

MO: It might be a bit early to ask but do you plan on working with Eric Rutan again on the next album, or will you move on to keep the sound evolving?

P: Yeah it probably is a bit early to answer that. You know, Eric has done a great job on both CD’s and I really don’t think anyone would have a problem if we worked with him again but yeah, it’s a bit early to really tell what’s going to happen for the next album.

MO: One thing Cannibal Corpse have always been well known for is gory album covers, however ‘Kill’ and ‘Evisceration Plague’ are both toned down compared to past releases. Is there any particular reason for this?

P: Well when we did ‘Kill’, it was like alright we had some artwork but that ended up being inside, in the booklet, the guy holding the knife kind of a thing. That was originally going to be the cover and we thought it was a good piece of art but everyone sort of opted that it wasn’t good enough at that point, and we were running out of time, that’s why ‘Kill’ ended up being what it was. But we just looked at it as, you know what, we had just released ‘Wretched Spawn’ and did some have problems with that, requiring alternative covers and all that, and after all the music itself was the most important thing. It’s music to the masses and it should be able to get out, it doesn’t matter what the cover should be really. We definitely felt confident that people should be buying it for the music and not because the piece of art. Now when you think about it, our two biggest sellers up to that point were ‘Kill’ and ‘The Bleeding’, which are both covers with nothing really, it’s all the music that’s why. ‘The Bleeding’ did so well because there were a lot of great songs on that record and it should just stand on its own and be the reason that a band is popular or people are buying our records.

So when it came to ‘Evisceration Plague’, we thought let’s definitely have artwork on the cover, make it a little more mysterious, and then we’ll have some more brutal stuff inside. So that’s what we opted to do, knowing that having a cover as it is now shouldn’t cause any problems worldwide since it’s nothing that graphic. You know, it’s cool but it’s not over the top, ‘Butchered at Birth’ style. And then we’ve got the cool, gory kind of stuff for people to look at and there you have it. I think it was a good plan.

MO: Away from the new album now, does the band ever get sick of Fishers World of Warcraft obsession?

P: [laughs] That’s a good question. Well you know none of us play it, but yeah we’d love for the guy to write some lyrics and be involved more but even before Warcraft he just wasn’t a lyricist. He wasn’t a song writing kind of guy. His job and his role in the band is to be up there singing the songs and he knows that. So it’s just like, if he can go up there and do his job then that’s all that matters. The rest of us don’t really play any video games anymore. He’s the only one in the band that does.

MO: Now a question that I have to ask, are there any plans to tour Australia for the new album?

P: Yeah we should be making it. I can’t confirm anything at this point but we’re definitely working on it and I hope we will be there sometime this year. So yeah nothing is confirmed but we definitely want to make our way back.

MO: A couple of general questions to finish off. I know it’s a fair way into the new year but did you have any favourite albums of 2008?

P: Ummm, not really. I don’t really listen to a lot of new music, so I know there were a lot of good releases that came out but, actually the only one that I do listen to, it’s the only band I really do keep up to date with on a regular basis and people usually are a little chastising, but it’s ‘The Presidents of the United States of America’. They came out with a great album and I love it, I love them. I think that came in out in 2008 so yeah, that would be my only one. Other than that, my ‘new’ CD’s are stuff that came out in 1970 where I go “wow, how I come I never had this”. Far from 2008, but new CD’s to me nonetheless.

MO: Was there any one album that convinced you to play an instrument in the first place?

P: It probably would have just been KISS in general. Back when I was 9 years old and I heard of KISS, I mean ‘Destroyer’ was actually the first album I ever bought and I thought it was just an amazing album cover and I was a KISS fanatic. Of course, most kids were when you were that age growing up back in the last 70’s like that. So that album just made you want to do it. I loved it, I was obsessed, it just gave me the itch. And then there was obviously Metallica and Slayer, those two bands were a big part as well.

MO: Any last words for you Australian fans?

P: We just definitely appreciate all the support from our Australian fans. It was awesome when we were down there and we will be back in 2009. Just keep it death metal!

Band: Cannibal Corpse
Date: 16/02/2009
Origin: USA
myspace.com/cannibalcorpse

Interviewer: Mitch Booth (Mean Machine)
Interviewee: Paul (drums)